Dear People Who Keep Company with God,
One of the exercises I recently assigned the students at Christ School of Ministry was to write a paper on their passions. The Bible uses the word zeal for what we call passion today (John 2:17). The purpose of the exercise was to help the students identify what their true passions are as passion is a powerful motivator and can direct decisions and life choices. It is so important for our passions to be according to true spiritual knowledge (Romans 10:2). I would like to share with you a little from my heart about one particular passion I have, it is the passion for Holy Spirit revival and spiritual awakening.
I was born again back in the 1970’s during times of renewal and revival; it has been called the charismatic renewal or the Jesus people movement. I am not really sure how church historians view this, but I know it was a time when many people were being birthed into the Kingdom of God and many believers outside traditional Pentecostal circles were discovering the gifts of the Holy Spirit for the first time. During this time a new style of worship was also emerging, choruses replaced traditional hymns, the guitar, bass and drums replaced the organ and worship teams replaced choirs.
It was a wonderful time and many were hungry for God and the things of the Holy Spirit; we were absolutely sold out to Christ as we used to say in those days. One day it all seemed to come to a sudden stop, in reality it did not happen in a day but it sure seemed like it. One day we were flying high and the next day we crashed and I mean we crashed hard. We found ourselves in a world without a tangible move of the Holy Spirit. We especially did not know what to do with ourselves as that is all we had ever known as believers. Literally we were like fish out of the water, trying to make our way on dry land. We were not made to be nominal Christians so we did not do the nominal thing very well.
I tell you all of this because I believe we were born for revival and spiritual awakening. It is in our spiritual DNA, all of us. The church was born out of a revival (Acts 2:2-3), and we are promised that the last days will be marked by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:17-21), this is the church’s inheritance and destiny. I believe the Lord is developing leaders in this hour that will be able to navigate the waters of these outpourings without crashing and falling short of what He desires to accomplish.
In spite of the fact that current move of the Holy Spirit at Riverlife does not look like what I had experienced in my early days, the moment I made the decision to humble myself and step down into what He was doing, I sensed in my spirit that this is what I was made for and a passion for revival awakened in me.
Shortly after this awakening I had a very vivid and powerful dream that continues to impact and speak to me. In the dream Becky and I had been ministering the Holy Spirit in a church and at the end of the service the small congregation all came and formed a line across the front of the sanctuary and begin to plead with us, they said this all we want for ourselves and our children, the Holy Spirit and revival. If we have this we know our children will be ok, please pray for this. It was the most holy moment that I have ever witnessed. I was totally broken by this in the dream; these people were the most humble and spiritually hungry people I have ever been around. It struck me that these people were immigrants to the United States. I also noted in the dream that the pastor was an American and seemed totally indifferent to his congregation and the gravity of that moment. He was in quite a hurry for the service to be over so he could go shopping (in the dream I saw him walking out of the church as the people cried out and into a shopping mall). I was infuriated with this man.
The Lord revealed to me that the immigrants were our forefathers who came to this nation seeking liberty to freely worship God and we are the children they were crying out for. They saw the future of our nation and the church and were crying out for the Holy Spirit and revival as they knew it would be their children’s only real hope. I believe the future has arrived and the Lord desires to commission our congregation for Holy Spirit revival and spiritual awakening.
One of the marks of a true leader in the kingdom of God is the ability to impart to those whom he or she has influence the things God has placed in their heart (2 Tim 1:6). It is my earnest prayer that Riverlife Fellowship would have passion for Holy Spirit led revival and spiritual awakening. The future of our nation is being weighted in the balance right now and only Holy Spirit revival and spiritual awakening will tip the scales away from a future of sure anarchy and destruction.
With all Sincerity, BW